Newsletter

Editorial: Due process not as important as good teachers

Topeka Unified School District 501’s teachers wasted little time approving a new contract with the district after the state’s legislators wrapped up their 2014 session.

Before they left Topeka, legislators passed a law that removed from Kansas statutes a guarantee of due process rights for the state’s established K-12 public school teachers.

The contract USD 501’s teachers had been working under included due process, but there was some concern that language could be removed if wrangling over a new contract continued through the fact-finding stage used to settle contract negotiations that have reach impasse. The new contract the teachers approved earlier this month includes a grievance procedure that involves independent hearings, which means teachers retained through the local negotiating process the due process rights that might have been lost as a result of action on the state level.

It’s good that the district’s teachers have the comfort of a grievance procedure that is acceptable to them. It’s also good that the process was negotiated with the district’s administration. No doubt teachers in many districts across the state will seek to secure due process rights in a similar fashion.

Such negotiations shouldn’t pose a problem as they allow school districts and their teachers to create a process that is designed on the local level and acceptable to both sides, although there is sure to be some give-and-take along the way.

In Topeka Unified School District 501, teachers worked through most of the past year without a new contract. The final sticking point was money, but teachers ultimately voted to accept the district’s offer, which included raises, and retain their due process rights.

As legislators considered the due process issue, many teachers and their supporters suggested the absence of the state’s due process provision could result in good teachers being fired without cause by administrators who didn’t like them for one reason or another or simply wanted to hire someone else.

Reason suggests that wouldn’t be the case. Most assistant principals, principals and superintendents are on career paths toward better and higher-paying jobs. To move up, they must show success in their current position, and it makes no sense for them to fire good teachers who can make them look good.

Firing good teachers would be counterproductive for an administrator. Even those who are happy and aren’t interested in another job are under pressure — from their supervisors, parents and society — to perform. That means students have to be learning at an acceptable pace, or better.

That requires good teachers, and administrators would want to retain as many of them as possible.